CSymposium 3 “Migration of People and Intercultural Studies”

ommentator“Home” and the Peopleof Fukushima
Mariko Tamanoi

Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Los Angeles

Listening to four panelists today brought to myin Los Angeles; he would make a temporary home inmind the theme of “home” (kokyô), but before I speak

Okinawa when he returns to this island; he nourishes hisof this theme, let me say a few words about my disci-soul on this island; but he will go back again to Los An-pline, anthropology. Anthropologists have long resisted

geles, another home for him. “Home,” then, is not athe study of migration, as they regarded migrants locat-

place to “return” to; rather it is a place to “make.” If so,

ing in between cultures: they are to be acculturated, so

the so-called “nomadic” people are by no means thewhile they are on the move, they are not appropriate sub-people who lost homes; they are the ones who “make”

jects for anthropologists to study. Considering that hu-homes as they move. I too am one of those nomads.

mans have constantly moved since the time

Having been moving back and forth between Japan andimmemorial, anthropologists’ “allergy” to migration

America, I no longer know which one is my home. I

seems strange. Today, however, “migration” has be-

think I have made a home in America but make a homecome one of the most important and popular topics

in Japan whenever I return.

among us. Yet this “migration” is not, or no longer, themigration from one place to another; rather, this “migra-

The man-made disaster of Fukushima Daiichi Nu-tion” represents the increase of the so-called “nomadicclear Power Plant, however, has created the situation inpeople,” who are constantly on the move and thus seen

which people cannot make homes any longer. Thoseas people who lost homes.

people who have lived near this power plant madehomes many decades or even centuries ago. However,Mr. Chinen spoke of the Uchinanchû returning tothey had to leave due to something they do not even

Okinawa from around the world once a year. Here, “re-see—radioactive isotopes that have contaminated andturning” does not mean to return to Okinawa perma-continue to contaminate for millions of years from now

nently and live here. Rather, they go back again to theon the place where they lived. Can they imagine theirplace where they live now. This is more of the “making”

home when they return to Fukushima, as the Uchi-of a home. For example, one Uchinanchû made a homenanchû can do so when they return to Okinawa? I doubt111

Homeland and now the people of Fukushima

they can, for the land has already been contaminated toJapanese government and the TEPCO should assist them

the point at which the complete decontamination is notin this process. And if they want to make Fukushima aspossible. This is extremely sad, but if we understandtheir home again, the government and the TEPCO

that “home” is a place to make, we feel a bit, only a bit

should also assist them to do so. Home is to make, yetin this situation, better. The people of Fukushima should

everyone needs home however temporary it is.

be allowed to make homes wherever they want, and the112